Paul Reynolds (BBC ): Blistering attacks threaten Iraq election

[Jack Rabbit]

From the BBC Online
Dated Wednesday January 5

Blistering attacks threaten Iraq election
Analysis
By Paul Reynolds

While the world's attention has been on the disaster in Asia, the situation in Iraq has deteriorated so much that the insurgency has developed into near-open warfare.

The head of Iraq's intelligence service Gen Muhammad Shahwani now puts the number of insurgents at 200,000, of which 40,000 are said to be the hard core and the rest active supporters.

These figures do not represent an insurgency. They represent a war.


Despite calls for the election to be delayed from its scheduled date of 30 January, the interim Prime Minister Iyyad Allawi insisted on Wednesday that the vote should go ahead.

For decades, the BBC has been a traditional source of news and information for those living in lands deprived of a free and independent press who want to be in the know. That is why this American, living in the era of Bush and corporatism, turns to the BBC Online.